Epistemic Modality Markers in Justin Trudeau's Speeches

NALA MAZIA, Dr. Tofan Dwi Hardjanto, M.A.

2018 | Skripsi | S1 SASTRA INGGRIS

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menyelidiki penanda modalitas epistemik dalam ranah politik, melalui pidato politik oleh Perdana Menteri ke-23 Kanada, Justin Trudeau. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengategorikan penanda epistemik ke dalam kelas-kelas kata, menganalisis makna semantik tiap penanda, serta menginvestigasi fungsinya dalam konteks sosial. Penanda-penanda yang ditemukan dari tiga teks pidato yang telah dianalisis terbagi dalam lima kelas kata, yaitu leksikal verba, modal adjektiva, modal adverbia, modal auxiliary verbs, dan modal nomina, dengan makna berkisar pada variasi kemungkinan, probabilitas, hingga keyakinan. Penanda-penanda tersebut juga menunjukkan komitmen pembicara, yang tingkatannya menggambarkan fungsinya dalam konteks sosial. Komitmen pembicara direalisasikan dalam tiga tingkatan epistemis, yang masing-masing berfungsi sebagai sarana ungkapan sopan, diplomatis, dan persuasif. Penelitian menyimpulkan bahwa Trudeau cenderung menggunakan ungkapan penilaian beralasan untuk tampil diplomatis dalam pidato-pidatonya.

This study sets out to investigate epistemic modality markers in political setting, through political speeches by the 23rd Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. It categorises the markers in terms of their word classes, their semantic meanings and their functions in the social context. The data were taken from three speeches by Justin Trudeau. The results show that the markers found in the three speeches analysed are of five different word classes, i.e., lexical verbs, modal adjectives, modal adverbs, modal auxiliary verbs and modal nouns, with meanings ranging from possibility, probability, to certainty. The markers also indicate the speaker’s commitment whose degree reflects the function in the social context. The speaker’s commitment is divided into three degrees of engagement, each of which serves as a means to be polite, to be diplomatic, and to be persuasive. The findings suggest that Trudeau tends to use reasonable judgment expressions to appear diplomatic in his speeches.

Kata Kunci : modalitas epistemik, pidato politik, fungsi sosial, komitmen pembicara